WW2 Story: B-17 Crew Flew 10 Minutes With No Nose

Name: WW2 Story: B-17 Crew Flew 10 Minutes With No Nose
Uploaded: 2026-09-06T14:08:06+00:00
Duration: 36 min 18 s
Channel: WW2 Records

00:00At 9.42 a.m. on July 14, 1944, 1st Lieutenant Ewald Swanson sat in the cockpit of a B

00:07-17G

00:08flying fortress nicknamed Mizpah, watching black clouds of flak explode across the sky

00:13over Budapest. 24 years old, 17 combat missions, zero margin for error. The Luftwaffe had positioned

00:21more than 288mm flak guns around the railway yards below, and they were all firing. Swanson's

00:28B-17 was part of a 60-aircraft formation from the 483rd Bomb Group flying out of Sterperone,

00:34Italy. The mission was simple on paper. Strike the shell oil refinery and railway yards in the

00:40heart of German-controlled Budapest. Cut the supply lines feeding the Eastern Front. Get

00:45home. But by July of 1944, bomber crews in the 15th Air Force knew the statistics. Out

00:52of every ten men who climbed into a B-17, eight would not return home. Some would die.

00:57Some would be captured. Some would simply disappear. The formation pressed forward through the curtain

01:03of flak. Shells burst in black puffs that could shred aluminum like paper. Mizpah took hits in the

01:09tail section, then the wings. Shrapnel punched holes through the fuselage. But the bomber stayed

01:15in formation. Behind Swanson, the crew held their positions. 2nd Lieutenant Paul Burnt sat in the

01:21co-pilot seat. 2nd Lieutenant Kenneth Dudley manned the bombardier station in the nose.

01:262nd Lieutenant Joe Henderson navigated from the compartment beside him. Eight more men were

01:31stationed throughout the aircraft. Radio operators, gunners, the flight engineer. Seconds away from the

01:37target, Dudley released the bomb load. Two tons of high explosive dropped toward the railway yards

01:43below. The B-17 lurched upward as the weight fell away. Then an 88-millimeter shell hit the nose of

01:49the

01:49aircraft. The explosion was instantaneous. The entire front section of Mizpah vaporized. The nose

01:56compartment. The bombardier station. The navigator position. The Norden bombsite. The plexiglass panels.

02:03Everything forward of the cockpit simply ceased to exist. Dudley died instantly. Henderson died

02:08instantly. The blast wave tore through what remained of the aircraft. The metal structure that had housed two

02:14men and thousands of pounds of equipment was gone. The center of gravity shifted backward. With no weight

02:20in the nose, Mizpah pitched up into a near vertical climb. The bomber began to stall. Swanson could see

02:27sky where instruments should have been. Cold air at 30,000 feet screamed through the open cavity. The

02:33temperature was 40 degrees below zero. Wind tore at his flight suit. Blood from the explosion covered the

02:39flight deck. Through the gap where the nose had been, Swanson could see the formation continuing toward

02:45the rally point. There was no control column. The yoke that connected to the flight control system had

02:50been mounted to the forward structure. That structure no longer existed. There were no instruments. The panel

02:57had been attached to the nose section. That was gone too. Swanson had no airspeed indicator. No altimeter.

03:03No artificial horizon. No way to know what the aircraft was doing except by feel and by looking at the

03:10horizon through the massive hole in front of him. But the control cables were still there. The steel

03:15cables that ran from the cockpit back through the fuselage to the rudder, elevators, and ailerons.

03:20They were exposed now, hanging in the wind. But they were intact. Swanson forced the B-17's nose down.

03:27He did not know how. There was nothing to push. Nothing to pull. But somehow, he got the aircraft

03:34level. Somehow, he got it back into loose formation with the group. The bomber should have been

03:39unflyable. Boeing engineers had designed the B-17 with inherent stability. But no engineer had planned

03:46for this. No manual covered flying without a cockpit. The only thing keeping MISPA in the air was physics

03:52and desperation. If you want to see how Swanson's crew pulled those bare cables to stay airborne,

03:57please hit that like button. It helps us share more forgotten stories. Subscribe if you haven't already.

04:03Back to Swanson. Behind him, the surviving crew members began moving forward. The radio operator.

04:10The flight engineer. They could see the exposed cables running through the bomb bay. They could see the wind

04:16tearing through the aircraft. They understood what had to happen next. Over 200 flat guns were still firing.

04:22The formation was still over enemy territory. And another shell was about to hit engine number two.

04:30The second 88mm shell struck engine number two at 9.44 AM. The right cyclone radial engine exploded in a

04:39spray of oil and metal fragments. Flames streamed back along the inboard nacelle on the left wing.

04:46The propeller windmilled for three seconds, then seized. Engine number two was dead.

04:53MISPA now had three engines instead of four. The bomber began losing airspeed. The formation was

04:59pulling ahead. Without the cockpit instruments, Swanson had no way to measure how fast they were

05:05falling behind. Technical Sergeant Frank Griminzi, the flight engineer, made his way forward from the

05:11top turret position. He could see the problem immediately. The control cables ran through the

05:17fuselage in bundles. Elevator cables, rudder cables, aileron cables. They were steel wire rope,

05:24each about three-eighths of an inch in diameter. Normally, they were enclosed in pulleys and fare leads,

05:31hidden behind panels and structure. Now, they were completely exposed. The wind was pulling at them.

05:38Without someone physically holding the cable steady, the aircraft would become uncontrollable.

05:44Staff Sergeant George Simonelli moved up from the radio compartment. Staff Sergeant Robert Bell came

05:50forward from the waste gun position. They positioned themselves near the bomb bay, where the main cable

05:56runs were visible. There was no discussion. No debate. The situation was obvious. Someone had to hold

06:03these cables. Someone had to pull them when Swanson needed control input. The problem was coordination.

06:10Swanson was sitting in what remained of the cockpit, 40 feet forward. The crew was standing in the bomb bay

06:17area. The intercom system was damaged. Communication would be nearly impossible. Swanson tried moving the rudder

06:24pedals. Nothing happened. The pedals were still attached to the floor, but the cables they normally actuated were now

06:32being buffeted by 300-mile-per-hour wind. He tried the throttles. Engines 1, 3, and 4 responded. That was

06:40something. But without control over the flight surfaces, the B-17 would eventually spiral out of formation and

06:46into a dive. Or worse, it would pitch up again, stall, and spin. Either way, everyone would die. The crew

06:54began pulling. They wrapped sections of cable around their hands for grip. The steel was cold. It cut into their

07:00gloves. When they pulled left on the rudder cable, Mispa's nose moved left. When they pulled right, it moved

07:06right. The elevators worked the same way. Pull back, the nose came up. Release, it dropped. The problem was that

07:14every input had to be perfectly timed. Too much pressure, and the aircraft would over-respond. Too little, and

07:20nothing would happen. And they were doing this without seeing what Swanson was seeing, without knowing what

07:25corrections he needed, without instruments or indicators. Mispa continued falling behind the

07:31formation. The other B-17s were maintaining their crew speed, heading southwest toward the Adriatic.

07:36Swanson's bomber was slower now. The drag from the missing nose section was enormous. The destroyed

07:42engine meant less power. And the formation was not waiting. They could not wait. Every minute over

07:48Hungary meant more exposure to fighters and flak. The standard procedure was clear. Aircraft that could

07:54not maintain formation speed were left behind. By 9.46 a.m., Mispa was alone. The formation was a mile

08:01ahead, then two miles. Swanson could see them in the distance, a cluster of dark shapes against the

08:07summer sky. His own aircraft was losing altitude. Not quickly, but steadily. They had been at 30,000 feet

08:14over the target. Now they were at 29,000. Then 28. The crew kept pulling cables. Their hands were cramping.

08:21The cold was brutal. Blood circulation was being cut off by the pressure of the steel against their

08:26palms. But they kept pulling. The fuel situation was unknown. The gauges were gone with the instrument

08:32panel. Swanson had no idea how much gasoline remained in the wing tanks. He had no idea how long three

08:38engines could keep them airborne. He had no idea if they were even heading in the right direction.

08:43Navigation required instruments. It required a map. It required the navigator, who was now dead

08:51somewhere over Budapest. All Swanson knew was Southwest. Fly Southwest. Get out of Hungary. Get over

09:00Yugoslavia. Get to the Adriatic. Get to Italy. Get home. Then the crew in the bomb bay started waving

09:08frantically toward the rear of the aircraft. Swanson could not turn around to look. The wind pressure

09:15through the open nose cavity made any movement dangerous. If he unbuckled from the pilot seat, he

09:21could be pulled forward and out of the aircraft. He stayed locked in position, watching the horizon,

09:26trying to keep the wings level. But the crew kept waving. Something was wrong in the rear section.

09:32Something beyond the missing nose. Beyond the dead engine. Beyond the exposed control cables.

09:38Staff Sergeant Charles Tucker, the tail gunner, had been in his position when the nose exploded. The tail

09:44section was the most isolated spot on a B-17. A small compartment at the very back of the fuselage,

09:50accessible only by crawling through the waist gun area on hands and knees. Tucker had felt the impact.

09:56He had felt the aircraft pitch up violently. He had felt it stabilize. But now he was feeling something else.

10:02The tail structure was flexing. The metal framework that held the vertical stabilizer and horizontal

10:08stabilizers was moving in ways it should not move. The explosion had created stress fractures somewhere

10:14in the fuselage. Or, shrapnel had weakened critical support members. Either way, the tail section was

10:21beginning to fail. If the tail came off, everyone would die instantly. A B-17 without a tail would enter

10:28an

10:29unrecoverable spin. The aircraft would tumble end over end until it disintegrated or hit the ground.

10:34There would be no time to bail out. No time to react. The crew in the bomb bay understood this.

10:41They could see the tail gunner's position through the fuselage. They could see the structure moving.

10:45And they had no way to fix it. Mispa was now at 26,000 feet. Still descending. Still heading southwest.

10:53Swanson estimated they had been flying without a cockpit for 4 minutes. Maybe 5. Every second felt like an hour.

11:01The wind noise was deafening. The cold was penetrating every layer of his flight suit. His hands on the throttles

11:07were going numb.

11:08But the throttles were the only controls he had left. Engine power was the only thing he could adjust without

11:14help from the crew pulling cables in the bomb bay.

11:17Second Lieutenant Paul Berndt, the co-pilot, was still in his seat. His control column was gone too. His instruments

11:24were gone.

11:24But he was watching the wings. Watching the engines. Watching for fighters.

11:31German Messerschmitt 109s and Focke-Wulf 190s hunted lone bombers. A damaged B-17 separated from its formation was an

11:40easy target.

11:41No defensive firepower from neighboring aircraft. No mutual support. Just one crippled bomber losing altitude over enemy territory.

11:49But so far, no fighters appeared. The Luftwaffe was either engaged elsewhere or had not spotted Mispa yet.

11:57The crew kept pulling cables. Their coordination was improving.

12:02When Swanson throttled back engine number 1, the aircraft wanted to yaw right.

12:07The crew compensated by pulling left rudder cable. When he increased power on engine number 4, they adjusted again.

12:14It was not flying. It was collective survival through brute force.

12:1810 men working as a single organism to keep 65,000 pounds of aluminum and steel in the air.

12:25At 9.50 a.m., Mispa crossed the Hungarian border into Yugoslavia.

12:31Swanson did not know this. He had no map.

12:33No landmarks he could identify through the gaping hole where his cockpit used to be.

12:38But the flak stopped. The black clouds of explosions ceased.

12:42That meant they were out of the heaviest defensive zones.

12:45That meant they might have a chance. A small chance. A chance that depended entirely on how long the tail

12:52structure would hold together.

12:54How long the crew could keep pulling cables. How long three engines could generate enough thrust.

13:00The fuel gauges were gone, but Swanson could hear the engines. He could feel their vibration through the airframe.

13:06They were running smoothly. That meant fuel was still flowing. That meant the wing tanks were not empty yet.

13:12But how much remained was impossible to know.

13:15B-17s carried 2,800 gallons of aviation gasoline, spread across multiple tanks.

13:21At cruise power, four engines burned roughly 200 gallons per hour.

13:25But they were not at cruise power.

13:26They were at maximum continuous power on three engines, trying to maintain altitude and airspeed.

13:32That meant fuel consumption was higher. Much higher.

13:36Swanson made a decision.

13:39The decision was simple. Get the crew out.

13:43The aircraft was dying. The tail structure was failing. The fuel supply was unknown.

13:48They were still over-occupied territory.

13:50Every minute in the air increased the risk of total structural failure.

13:54If Mizpah broke apart at altitude, no one would survive.

13:58But if the crew could bail out while the aircraft was still controllable, most of them would have a chance.

14:03They would be captured. They would spend months in prisoner of war camps.

14:07But they would be alive.

14:09The problem was execution.

14:11Bailing out of a B-17 required coordination.

14:14The standard procedure involved specific exit points.

14:17The bombardier and navigator used the forward escape hatch in the nose.

14:21But that hatch no longer existed.

14:23The radio operator and others used the wastegun windows or the rear door.

14:27The ball turret gunner had to rotate his turret to a specific position before climbing out.

14:32Each crew member had practiced this dozens of times in training.

14:35But training assumed the aircraft was intact.

14:38Training assumed the pilot could communicate over the intercom.

14:41Training assumed there was time to organize an orderly evacuation.

14:44Swanson had none of those things.

14:46He had no intercom.

14:48He had no way to give the order.

14:50He had no way to coordinate who went first and who went last.

14:53And he could not leave his position.

14:55The moment he unbuckled, the moment he tried to move toward an exit,

14:59the aircraft would become uncontrollable.

15:01The crew in the bomb bay would lose any reference for which cables to pull.

15:05The B-17 would enter a dive or a spin within seconds.

15:09Everyone still aboard would die.

15:11At 9.52am, Mispa was at 24,000 feet.

15:15They had been flying without a cockpit for 10 minutes.

15:18Swanson's hands were locked on the throttles.

15:20His feet were on the rudder pedals.

15:22Even though the pedals did nothing without the crew pulling cables 30 feet behind him.

15:26Bernt sat motionless in the co-pilot seat, watching the horizon, watching the wings,

15:31watching for any sign of catastrophic failure.

15:34Neither man spoke.

15:36There was nothing to say.

15:37The wind noise made conversation impossible anyway.

15:41The crew in the bomb bay made the decision themselves.

15:43They could feel the tail structure flexing.

15:46They could see the stress cracks spreading through the fuselage skin.

15:49They understood that staying aboard meant dying when the aircraft came apart.

15:53One by one, they began moving toward the wastegun windows.

15:57Staff Sergeant Robert Bell went first.

15:59He clipped his parachute harness, positioned himself at the window opening, and jumped.

16:04The slipstream took him instantly.

16:07Staff Sergeant Charles Kelly went next.

16:09Then Staff Sergeant George Simonelli.

16:12Then Technical Sergeant Frank Grimenzi.

16:14Each time a man jumped, the aircraft became harder to control.

16:18Fewer hands on the cables meant less precise inputs.

16:21The B-17 began wallowing.

16:24The wings dipped left, then right.

16:26The nose pitched up slightly.

16:28Swanson adjusted throttle settings to compensate, but throttle alone was not enough.

16:33He needed the rudder.

16:34He needed the elevators.

16:36He needed the crew pulling cables.

16:38But the crew was abandoning ship.

16:40They had to.

16:41It was the only rational choice.

16:44Staff Sergeant Charles Tucker crawled forward from the tail gunner position.

16:47He squeezed through the narrow passage, emerged in the wastegun area, and saw the empty positions

16:53where his crewmates had been standing moments before.

16:55He saw the exposed control cables, now slack without hands holding them.

17:00He saw the massive opening where the nose used to be, 40 feet forward.

17:05He clipped on his parachute and jumped.

17:07By 9.54 a.m., five men had evacuated.

17:11Five men were descending under parachute canopies over Yugoslavia.

17:15Five men would be captured by German forces within hours.

17:19But five men would survive the day.

17:21That left five men still aboard Mispa.

17:24Swanson in the pilot seat.

17:26Burnt in the co-pilot seat.

17:27And three others who had not yet reached the exit points.

17:30The aircraft was at 22,000 feet, still descending, still barely controllable.

17:36And the tail structure was about to fail completely.

17:41The remaining crew members moved toward the exits.

17:45Staff Sergeant Paul Hish, waist gunner, went through the window opening.

17:49His parachute deployed cleanly.

17:51Staff Sergeant Robert Tucker, another waist gunner, followed seconds later.

17:56That left three men aboard.

17:58Swanson, Burnt, and one more crew member still making his way forward from a rear position.

18:04The aircraft was becoming increasingly unstable.

18:07With almost no one pulling the control cables, Mispa was responding only to engine power and inherent aerodynamic stability.

18:15That stability was designed for normal flight conditions.

18:18Not for flight without a nose section.

18:20Not for flight with a failing tail structure.

18:23At 9.56 a.m., the last crew member reached the waist gun area, jumped, and disappeared into the slipstream.

18:31Swanson and Burnt were alone.

18:33Two men in the remains of a B-17 flying fortress at 20,000 feet over Yugoslavia.

18:39The bomber was still descending.

18:41Three engines were still running.

18:43But the aircraft was no longer truly flyable.

18:46It was barely staying in the air through a combination of residual stability and the fact that the wings were

18:52still generating lift.

18:53Without crew members pulling cables, any significant control input was impossible.

18:58Swanson turned his head slightly and made eye contact with Burnt.

19:02No words were exchanged.

19:04The wind noise would have drowned out any conversation.

19:07But the message was clear.

19:09Burnt needed to go.

19:10There was no reason for the co-pilot to stay aboard.

19:13He had no controls.

19:15He had no function.

19:16If he stayed, he would die when the aircraft finally broke apart or crashed.

19:21The only rational choice was to bail out while altitude remained.

19:25While there was still time to deploy a parachute and survive the landing.

19:29Burnt unbuckled his harness.

19:31He stood up from the co-pilot seat.

19:33He moved carefully toward the rear of the flight deck where he could access the main fuselage and reach the

19:39waist gun exit.

19:39He looked back at Swanson one final time.

19:42The pilot was still locked in position.

19:44Hands on throttles.

19:46Eyes forward.

19:47Holding the dying aircraft as steady as possible.

19:51Burnt climbed through the crawlway behind the cockpit and headed aft.

19:5430 seconds later, he jumped.

19:57Ewald Swanson was alone.

19:59One man in a 65,000 pound bomber at 19,000 feet.

20:04The aircraft was falling at approximately 200 feet per minute.

20:08Not a dive, just a steady descent.

20:11The three remaining engines were producing enough thrust to maintain forward speed, but not enough to hold altitude.

20:18The missing nose created massive drag.

20:20The aerodynamic profile was destroyed.

20:23The B-17 was essentially a flying brick with wings.

20:27The fuel situation remained unknown.

20:30The wing tanks could be nearly full or nearly empty.

20:33There was no way to tell.

20:34The engine sound gave no indication.

20:37Wright's cyclone engines ran smoothly until the fuel supply was completely exhausted, at which point they simply stopped.

20:44No warning.

20:45No sputtering.

20:47Just silence.

20:48And if all three engines quit simultaneously, MISPA would drop out of the sky.

20:54Swanson estimated his position.

20:56They had been flying southwest for approximately 14 minutes since leaving Budapest.

21:01Airspeed was probably around 180 miles per hour, maybe less.

21:05That meant they had covered roughly 40 miles, maybe 45.

21:10The border between Hungary and Yugoslavia was approximately 30 miles from Budapest.

21:15That meant they were likely over Yugoslavia now, possibly approaching the mountains, possibly approaching the Adriatic coast.

21:22But all of this was guesswork.

21:24Without instruments, without maps, without a navigator, he was flying blind.

21:28The question was how long to stay aboard.

21:32Every minute at the controls meant the crew below had more time to distance themselves from the crash site.

21:37German patrols would search for a downed bomber.

21:40But if Swanson could keep MISPA flying for another few minutes, the crew members under parachutes would land miles away

21:46from where the aircraft eventually hit the ground.

21:48That separation could mean the difference between capture and evasion, between imprisonment and freedom.

21:56But staying aboard also meant increased risk of dying in the crash.

22:00The tail structure was still flexing.

22:02The bomber could break apart at any moment.

22:04And when Swanson finally decided to bail out, he would have to unbuckle, stand up, move through the aircraft to

22:12an exit point, and jump.

22:13All while the B-17 was uncontrolled.

22:16All while it was potentially entering a death spiral.

22:20At 9.58 a.m., Swanson made his final decision.

22:25He would stay with the aircraft for two more minutes.

22:28That would give the crew more separation distance.

22:31That would give them a better chance.

22:34Then he would go.

22:36Swanson kept his hands on the throttles.

22:38The three Wright Cyclone engines continued their steady roar.

22:41Engine number one on the far left wing.

22:44Engine number three inboard on the right wing.

22:47Engine number four on the far right wing.

22:50All running smoothly.

22:52All consuming fuel at an unknown rate.

22:55The bomber descended through 18,000 feet.

22:58At 10 a.m. exactly, Swanson released the throttles.

23:01He unbuckled his harness.

23:03The moment the straps came loose, he felt the wind pressure trying to pull him forward toward the massive opening

23:09where the nose used to be.

23:10He pushed back against his seat, then stood up carefully.

23:14The aircraft immediately began to pitch.

23:17Without anyone controlling the throttles, without anyone making corrections,

23:22Mispa started a gentle left roll.

23:24Swanson moved quickly toward the rear of the flight deck.

23:27He squeezed through the narrow crawlway that led to the bomb bay area.

23:31Behind him, the bomber's nose dropped.

23:34The control cables hung loose in the bomb bay.

23:37Nobody was pulling them now.

23:39Nobody was holding the aircraft steady.

23:41Swanson could feel the B-17 accelerating into a dive.

23:45He had maybe 30 seconds before the angle became too steep,

23:49before the G-forces made movement impossible,

23:52before the aircraft entered a spin.

23:54He reached the waste gun area.

23:56The aluminum floor was vibrating under his boots.

23:59The wind noise was overwhelming.

24:01He grabbed his parachute pack from the storage rack,

24:04clipped it to his harness, and moved toward the window opening.

24:07The bomber was diving now.

24:09Not vertically, but steeply enough that Swanson had to brace himself against the fuselage to stay upright.

24:15He positioned himself at the waste gun window,

24:18looked out at the Yugoslav countryside 17,000 feet below, and jumped.

24:23The slipstream hit him like a physical wall.

24:26The wind spun him sideways.

24:28The B-17 flashed past, engine still roaring,

24:32already 200 feet away and accelerating downward.

24:35Swanson pulled the ripcord.

24:37The parachute deployed with a violent jerk that knocked the wind from his lungs.

24:42Then silence.

24:44Relative silence.

24:45The roar of the engines faded as Mizpah continued its dive.

24:49Swanson watched the bomber fall.

24:51The tail section was still attached, but barely.

24:55The entire rear fuselage was flexing like a reed in the wind.

24:58At 15,000 feet, the tail separated.

25:02The B-17's forward section pitched nose down almost vertically.

25:07It fell for another eight seconds, then disappeared into a line of trees two miles away.

25:12A column of black smoke rose moments later.

25:15The fuel tanks had ignited on impact.

25:18Nothing survived that crash.

25:20No one could have survived it.

25:22If Swanson had stayed aboard for another 30 seconds, he would be dead.

25:27The parachute descent was slow.

25:29Swanson drifted southwest with the prevailing wind.

25:33Below him, the Yugoslav landscape showed scattered farms, forests, and small villages.

25:38Somewhere down there were German occupation forces.

25:42Somewhere down there were his crew members, who had jumped minutes before him.

25:47Somewhere down there was the reality that his war was over.

25:51He was about to become a prisoner.

25:53The ground came up faster than expected.

25:57Swanson could see trees.

25:58He tried to steer the parachute toward an open field, but the canopy was not designed for precision maneuvering.

26:04The trees were directly below him now.

26:07He hit the upper branches at approximately 15 miles per hour.

26:11Branches snapped.

26:12The parachute canopy caught on limbs.

26:15Swanson crashed through the foliage and slammed into a thick branch with his left side.

26:20He felt his left leg break.

26:22The bone snapped cleanly somewhere between the knee and ankle.

26:26Pain exploded through his nervous system.

26:29He fell another 10 feet and came to a stop.

26:32Tangled in parachute lines and broken branches, 15 feet above the ground.

26:36Blood was running down his leg.

26:38His flight suit was torn.

26:41Deep lacerations covered his left thigh, where branches had cut through fabric and skin.

26:45His left leg was bent at an unnatural angle.

26:49He could not move it.

26:50Could not put weight on it.

26:52Could not climb down from the tree.

26:54He hung there, suspended in the parachute harness, trying to control the pain.

26:59Trying to stay conscious.

27:01Below him, he heard voices.

27:03German voices.

27:07German soldiers arrived at the base of the tree within minutes.

27:10They were Wehrmacht infantry, part of an occupation unit stationed in the area.

27:15They had seen the parachutes descending.

27:17They had heard the crash of the B-17.

27:20Now they were collecting American air crew.

27:22Swanson hung motionless in his harness, 15 feet above the ground, unable to move, unable to escape.

27:29One of the soldiers called up to him.

27:31Swanson did not respond.

27:33The soldiers began discussing how to get him down.

27:36They found a ladder from a nearby farm.

27:38Two men climbed up and cut the parachute lines.

27:41They lowered Swanson carefully, trying not to worsen the leg injury.

27:45When they reached the ground, they laid him on his back in the dirt.

27:48A German medic arrived.

27:50He examined the broken leg, the lacerations, the blood loss.

27:53He applied a temporary splint using wooden boards and strips of cloth.

27:57He injected morphine from a medical kit.

28:00The pain began to fade.

28:02Swanson felt the drug taking effect, dulling the sharp agony in his leg to a distant throb.

28:07The medic wrapped the deep cuts with bandages.

28:09He checked for other injuries.

28:11Ribs seemed intact.

28:12No head trauma.

28:13No internal bleeding that he could detect.

28:15The primary concern was the leg.

28:18Without proper treatment, infection would set in.

28:20Without surgery, the bone might not heal correctly.

28:23But for now, the medic had done what he could with limited supplies in a forest clearing.

28:28The Germans transported Swanson to a local command post.

28:31From there, he was moved to a Wehrmacht medical facility.

28:34A German doctor examined the leg, confirmed the fracture, and set the bone properly.

28:39The procedure was painful despite the morphine.

28:42Swanson passed out twice during the process.

28:45When he regained consciousness, his leg was in a plaster cast from ankle to hip.

28:49The doctor explained through an interpreter that the fracture was clean.

28:53The bone would heal.

28:55But Swanson would not walk normally for months.

28:57Over the next three days, the rest of Mizpah's crew was captured.

29:01All eight men who had bailed out were found within a 20-mile radius of the crash site.

29:06None had evaded capture.

29:08The Yugoslav countryside was heavily patrolled.

29:11Partisan resistance groups operated in the mountains,

29:13but the crew had landed in farmland controlled by German forces.

29:18One by one, they were brought to the same processing center.

29:21Swanson saw them arrive.

29:23Berndt.

29:24Grimenzi.

29:25Simonelli.

29:26Bell.

29:27Kelly.

29:28Tucker.

29:29Hish.

29:29All alive.

29:31All uninjured except for minor cuts and bruises.

29:34All now prisoners of war.

29:36They were transported to a prisoner of war camp in Austria, Stalag Luft IV,

29:42a facility specifically designated for captured Allied aircrew.

29:46The camp housed approximately 10,000 American and British pilots, navigators, bombardiers, gunners, and flight engineers.

29:54Conditions were harsh, but not brutal.

29:56Food was limited.

29:58Red Cross parcels arrived irregularly.

30:00The barracks were cold in winter.

30:03Medical care was minimal.

30:04But the Germans generally followed Geneva Convention protocols for officer prisoners.

30:09There were no mass executions.

30:11No systematic torture.

30:12Just confinement, boredom, and waiting.

30:16Swanson's leg healed slowly.

30:17He spent the first two months on crutches.

30:20The cast came off in September of 1944.

30:23Physical therapy was basic.

30:25He walked around the camp perimeter every day, rebuilding strength in the damaged leg.

30:30By October, he could walk without assistance.

30:33By November, the limp was barely noticeable.

30:36By December, he was physically recovered.

30:38But the war continued.

30:40The camp remained locked.

30:42Guards patrolled the wire.

30:43Escape attempts were rare and mostly unsuccessful.

30:47The crew of Mizpah settled into the routine of captivity.

30:50They talked about the mission.

30:51About the 88mm shell.

30:53About the 10 minutes they flew without a cockpit.

30:56About pulling the control cables by hand.

30:59About watching their bomber fall into the Yugoslav forest.

31:02About Dudley and Henderson, who died instantly when the nose exploded.

31:06About how close they all came to dying that day.

31:09And they waited.

31:10Waited for the war to end.

31:13Waited for liberation.

31:15Waited to go home.

31:17Winter turned to spring.

31:19The Germans began evacuating camps as Soviet forces advanced from the east.

31:24Prisoners were marched westward in long columns.

31:27Conditions deteriorated.

31:29Food became scarce.

31:30Some men died during the forced marches.

31:34Others escaped in the chaos.

31:37Swanson and his crew stayed together.

31:39They marched through Germany as the Third Reich collapsed around them.

31:43And on April 30th, 1945, American forces reached their column.

31:50They were free.

31:52Nine months of captivity ended on a dirt road in central Germany.

31:56American tanks rolled past.

31:58Soldiers distributed food, water, and cigarettes.

32:02Medical personnel checked for injuries and disease.

32:04The former prisoners were transported to collection points, then to airfields, then back to Italy, and eventually to the United

32:12States.

32:12The crew of Mizpah went home.

32:15All eight survivors.

32:17All eight men who had pulled control cables by hand at 30,000 feet over Budapest.

32:23All eight men who had jumped from a dying bomber and lived.

32:28Ewald Swanson returned to civilian life in Michigan.

32:31He married, raised a family, worked quietly for decades.

32:36He rarely spoke about July 14th, 1944.

32:40When asked, he would say only that he had been lucky.

32:44That the crew had been lucky.

32:46That Dudley and Henderson had not been lucky.

32:49He did not consider himself a hero.

32:52He considered himself a pilot who had done his job under impossible circumstances.

32:57The Army Air Forces disagreed.

33:00Swanson was promoted over the following years, eventually retiring as Lieutenant Colonel.

33:05The recognition was not for a single mission, but for a career of service.

33:10But that single mission remained the defining moment.

33:14The ten minutes without a cockpit.

33:16The ten minutes that should have killed everyone aboard.

33:20The crew stayed in contact.

33:22They attended 483rd Bomb Group reunions.

33:25They gathered every few years to remember the war, the missions, the men who did not return.

33:31The bond between them was unbreakable.

33:34They had survived something that should not have been survivable.

33:37They had flown a bomber with no nose, no instruments, no cockpit, and bare control cables exposed to 300-mile

33:45-per-hour wind.

33:47They had done it through coordination, through determination, through the simple refusal to give up.

33:53And they had honored Dudley and Henderson by surviving, by making sure their sacrifice meant something.

34:00Paul Berndt, the co-pilot, stayed in Michigan near Swanson.

34:04They remained friends until the end.

34:06Frank Remenzi returned to his family and rarely discussed the war.

34:10George Simonelli kept photographs from the mission.

34:13He showed them to his grandchildren decades later, explaining what it meant to pull steel cables while a bomber fell

34:19apart around you.

34:20The others scattered across the country.

34:22But they remembered.

34:24They all remembered.

34:26Ewald Swanson died in 2009 at the age of 89.

34:30He had lived a full life.

34:32He had seen the world change.

34:34He had seen aircraft evolve from propeller-driven bombers to jets to spacecraft.

34:39But the aircraft he remembered most clearly was MISPA.

34:43The B-17G that lost its nose over Budapest.

34:47The bomber that flew on borrowed time and crew determination.

34:51The aircraft that proved human will could overcome engineering limits.

34:57If this story moved you the way it moved us, do me a favor.

35:00Hit that like button.

35:02Every single like tells YouTube to show this story to more people.

35:05Hit subscribe and turn on notifications.

35:08We're rescuing forgotten stories from dusty archives every single day.

35:13Stories about bomber crews who refused to quit when physics said they should.

35:17Real people.

35:19Real heroism.

35:20Drop a comment right now and tell us where you're watching from.

35:23Are you watching from the United States?

35:25United Kingdom?

35:27Canada?

35:27Australia?

35:28Our community stretches across the entire world.

35:31You're not just a viewer.

35:33You're part of keeping these memories alive.

35:35Tell us your location.

35:37Tell us if someone in your family served.

35:39Just let us know you're here.

35:42And thank you for making sure Ewald Swanson and the crew of MISPA don't disappear into

35:47silence.

35:48Second Lieutenant Kenneth Dudley died instantly when that 88mm shell hit.

35:53Second Lieutenant Joe Henderson died beside him.

35:56They were 23 and 24 years old.

35:59They never came home.

36:00But the eight men who survived carried their memory forward.

36:04For nine months in a prisoner of war camp.

36:07For decades afterward in Michigan and across America.

36:10And now through this story their names live on.

36:14These men deserve to be remembered.

36:16And you're helping make that happen.

36:17every year is a second friend and a third friend.

36:17And now through this馬鹹 Page in, let us know what

WW2 Story: B-17 Crew Flew 10 Minutes With No Nose

Category

Transcript

Recommended